Garrett Hedlund Gains Country Cred, But Not Country Career
In the new movie, 'Country Strong,' Garrett Hedlund has to play a convincing star on the rise. That meant months of guitar and vocal lessons for Garrett, but he also took his inspiration from some unlikely sources.
"I was looking at the back cover of vinyl [albums] and seeing pictures and getting the gist of the soul of what these guys were," he tells The Boot. "I was watching things like 'Hud' or old [Paul] Newman monologues."
He also studied traditional artists like Kris Kristofferson, Waylon Jennings and Merle Haggard, acts whom he believes his character, Beau Hutton, would have adored.
But mainly he practiced, practiced and practiced some more. For four months, he worked with guitarist Neal Casal, best known as a member of Ryan Adams and the Cardinals. "Four days, five days a week, he'd come over and jam," Garrett recalls. "Old Hank Williams songs or The Byrds or things like this just to get the chords and transitions down. [Then] going into the studio to [learning] chart progressions to singing and overcoming those jitters, man, takes time, a lot of time."
Garrett then moved to Nashville a few months before shooting started, living in a cabin on co-star Tim McGraw's property, and working on the specific songs his character would perform in the movie. "[I was] playing guitar in front of the fire. It was wonderful. It was a lot of work. Every single day was a day filled with studio work, guitar training."
He also developed his lean-into-the microphone style. "It's like leaning down for a kiss," Garrett says. "I'm just glad it wasn't a headset mic and me having to go around the stag and be that. It was much more of a singer/songwriter posture and being there speaking to the audience, rather than grandly presenting yourself to the audience."
After all that work, it would seem that Garrett would be primed to put it all to practice in the real world and record an album of his own, but he laughs off such suggestions, answering a concrete "No," when asked if he plans to make his own records.
Garrett can be heard on the 'Country Strong' soundtrack, however, on the song 'Chances Are.' Watch him perform the song in the exclusive video clip below.
'Country Strong' opens in theaters nationwide on January 7.